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NAACP remarks 'not being racist,' Wilson says

Sam Wilson says he regrets nothing. On Tuesday, he was called a "racist and a bigot," among other things, after he took issue with the word "colored" in the NAACP's name at the weekly Sussex County Council meeting. 5/15/14

His comments drew strong responses. A colleague on Council said Wilson showed "poor judgment."

"People are hung up too much on who they are or what color they are. I don't get hung up on it," Wilson said Wednesday. "It's certainly not being racist to ask the question."

Wilson touched off the controversy when he objected to giving a county grant to the Lower Sussex Branch NAACP Youth Council.

"I'm not going to give anything. Unless you can describe what that says," he told a county staffer who was reciting to Council which organizations were asking for grants this week. "What's NAACP stand for?"

The group's acronym stands for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. Wilson, in the Council meeting, indicated the phrase "colored people" signified the NAACP must be involved in "discrimination."

Vance Phillips, another councilman, said he agreed with Wilson and would not give the Youth Council any money from his discretionary fund either.

On Wednesday, amplifying comments, Wilson said he believed the NAACP advocated only for black people to the exclusion of white people.

"How do you think it would fly if I said, 'This is for the NAAWP?' I don't think it would fly, either," Wilson said. "It's not my goal to say the blacks are over there and the whites are over here. That's not what I want to do and I didn't intend to do that."

The history of the NAACP is not of a blacks-only club. Started in 1909 to combat lynchings, the group was founded by several dozen people, only seven of whom were African-American.

Its first president was a white lawyer, Moorfield Storey. One of the best-known black activists of the time, W.E.B. DuBois, was the only black member of the original board of directors. All of the group's executives in the modern era have been black.

"The councilman is incorrect in his assumption that the NAACP is an organization that would reject anyone from joining because of race," said Jotaka Eaddy, senior director of the group's voting rights project. "Anyone who wants to work with us toward our mission, we're ready and willing to work with them."

Wilson, a Republican and farmer of land just outside Georgetown, said he's had only supportive calls and messages from constituents about his comments.

"I've had people call me who said that I said the right thing, asked the right questions. I've never had people call who disagreed," he said. "I know a lot of black folks who would probably agree with me."

Richard Smith, president of the Delaware chapter of the NAACP, said Tuesday that Wilson and Phillips "seem to be racists and bigots" after he heard the exchange.

Of that criticism, Wilson said: "To be honest with you, he's more of a racist and a bigot than I am."

Local black leaders strenuously disagreed with Wilson, who has staked out strongly held positions on social issues before.

When the state was debating gay marriage in 2013, Wilson used a Council meeting to say allowing same-sex marriage was "legislating immorality," and warned that allowing it "leads back to child abuse."

Later that year, when a Sussex school board voted not to add an elective high school course on Bible literacy, Wilson told a radio host it was because "one of them is a lesbian," and "they're not very strong on the Bible."

"Taking into consideration the things Sam has said, I'm not shocked, but I am surprised," said Jane Hovington, the Lower Sussex Branch NAACP president. "But people are incensed."

Right-leaning talk radio in Sussex County took Wilson's side on Wednesday.

"Good for Sam for speaking up," Jared Morris, a host for Delaware 105.9, wrote in a blog entry suggesting Wilson was wise to distance himself from the NAACP because "the media elite" would someday soon "decide that supporting an organization that uses a 'racist' term like colored people is, in itself, racist."

After Wilson and Phillips objected to contributing $100 in their names to the Youth Council's customary $500 annual grant from the county, George Cole, a GOP council member from Ocean View, tried to smooth things over. Cole made a motion to give the group $500 this year without touching Wilson's and Phillips' discretionary accounts, and that motion passed quickly.

On Wednesday, Cole said he didn't want constituents to think the entire County Council had a problem with the NAACP.

"It was really just the two of them showing poor judgment, in my opinion," Cole said. "It reflects on the whole County Council. But no, the whole County Council did not do that." Cole also said it was unwise for the Council's only democrat, Joan Deaver, to deliver a retort to Phillips and Wilson that referenced the Ku Klux Klan. Deaver did not return a call for comment Wednesday.

Wilson said he was not bothered by the controversy his remarks caused.

"My dad used to say, the more you stir the pot, the worse it stinks," Wilson said. "And I think I stirred it pretty well yesterday."